Shifting line of religion in Singapore

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http://www.todayonline.com/Singapore/EDC110113-0000248/The-shifting-lines-and-the-Singapore-population

There is this report in Today and the news today about the findings from the latest Census. One thing that caught my eyes is the decrease in the proportion of Buddhists and Taoists in Singapore among the Chinese population and the increase in people without religious affiliation.

Buddhism remains the main religion here, but its share of followers changed the most. Buddhists accounted for 33 per cent of the resident population aged 15 years and above last year, compared to 43 per cent in 2000.
Shifts in religious affiliation were felt more in the Chinese community, with 57 per cent identifying themselves as Buddhists or Taoists, down from 64 per cent in 2000. Meanwhile, the proportion of persons with no religion was 22 per cent, up from 19 per cent previously.
I pondered about the shifting line of religion in that two short paras. Coming from such a background myself, it has to be understood that Chinese religions are losing followers increasingly either to the humanists/atheists/agnostics or Christianity. And I think I can offer a few experiential reasons why this is so. Firstly, Chinese religions do not offer any relevance to the generations today. And I am not even going into Christianity here today. In my family, rituals are performed not with understandings, but just because of customs and piety. But honestly, these are assumed to be understood for the older generation, with the younger generation thinking why on earth they are wasting their time visiting those temples and participating in those rituals when they have better things to do. This apparently is a fact that older generations fail increasingly to understand. To interject here a little, that is why churches with youth groups today, such as CHC and NCC, are able to attract much Chinese youths and other races as well. Precisely because they are able to provide relevance and relevant companionship among people from the same age group. Little wonder, since Chinese religions ceased to provide any meaning for this Gen-X and Gen-Y people.

Amid rising religiosity in the world, the Census of Population 2010 has found that the proportion of persons without religious affiliation here has increased. They formed 17 per cent of the resident population (citizens and permanent residents) aged 15 years and above last year, up from 15 per cent in 2000.
 Little wonder why people without religious affiliation are increasing in numbers. A secularised society who expel any notion of the divine in their culture is bound to go down this road. It is the same for post-Christian countries such as the USA. Singapore is really going down this road and given a society that is chasing after money and success, I am not at all surprised.

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